


American Money

by WhatWereMadeOf



Category: Buzzfeed Unsolved (Web Series)
Genre: Alternate Universe, Blow Jobs, Getting Together, Haunted Houses, M/M, Meet-Cute, Minor Gun Violence, Road Trips, Supernatural Elements
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-02-01
Updated: 2020-02-01
Packaged: 2021-02-25 02:54:38
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 13,824
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22425031
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/WhatWereMadeOf/pseuds/WhatWereMadeOf
Summary: It was like a bomb went off. Sand exploded into the air less than five feet from Ryan's motorcycle, showering him and blinding him as he flew by at 60 miles an hour. He swung violently from side to side, barely just managing to stay in control, until he skidded to a shaky halt.Or, Ryan has a show called "Unsolved: On the Road" and meets an unusual Shane under unusual circumstances.
Relationships: Ryan Bergara/Shane Madej
Comments: 44
Kudos: 190





	American Money

**Author's Note:**

> I did the hover-translation thing if you're interested, but if not or if you're on mobile, don't worry about it. You should be able to get the gist without them. Not a native German speaker, so please be patient. <3
> 
> Title taken from the song "American Money" by BØRNS.

It was like a bomb went off. Sand exploded into the air less than five feet from Ryan's motorcycle, showering him and blinding him as he flew by at 60 miles an hour. He swung violently from side to side, barely just managing to stay in control, until he skidded to a shaky halt.

His heart pounded in his chest as he hunkered down behind the motorcycle. As the dust cleared and there wasn't any more immediate danger, he removed his helmet and reluctantly started toward the source.

_Oh god._

A body lie splayed out in the sand, face down. It was a tall, skinny man not much older than Ryan, dressed in nothing but a gray T-shirt and jeans. Not exactly desert-ready. He stared at the man for a second then held his breath and looked around. They were alone along a straight stretch of road, no other signs of life for miles and miles.

_Did he...?_

Ryan looked up in time to see the clouds rush to fill the smallest hole in their exterior. Ryan's eyebrows furrowed.

_How...?_

Looking back down at what he'd assumed was a very dead body, his breath caught in his throat. He stepped back. The chest had moved. He watched it for another minute, and sure enough, there it was, a shaky rise and fall.

Ryan frantically looked up and down the road again before checking his phone. No signal, no other vehicles on the road. What could he do?

_Okay Ryan okay Ryan think, snap decision snap decision, you don't have time to freak out..._

He dug through his saddle bag and pulled out his bungee cords.

 _Alright...okay buddy._ He ran back over, cords in hand. _You're coming with me, okay?_

It was a struggle, but eventually Ryan got the other man, much larger than himself, onto the back of his bike in an upright position and tethered them together around the waist and both legs.

Is this stupid? Ryan thought as rode off in the direction he'd come from. So much for the restock.

\---

"So he's dead?" The voice on the other line crackled.

"I'm telling you Jake, he's alive! Maybe...barely...but he's breathing. Nothing's bleeding. Just tell me how to check his vitals." 

"Ryan you can't just tell me a man fell out of the sky and..." The connection cut in and out. "...else, every bone in his body should be broken from a fall like that. You need to be calling the police, not an ambulance. And not me!"

Ryan frowned and looked out the kitchen window. A wall of dark, red clouds was slowly descending on the area from the west, coming up from the ground rather than down from the sky. It was too late to go anywhere. He'd missed that window of time.

"I tried, okay? Police didn't pick up, the closest hospital is hundreds of miles away, I even called some random number I found on the internet that was supposed to be the FBI. Everything's either too far away or...not the FBI."

He turned and walked back to the bedroom with quilts piled up in his arms, balancing the cell phone between his ear and shoulder. The floorboards creaked underfoot.

"Okay, I'll walk you through vitals if you really want, but you're just setting yourself up for..."

"Listen, I know, okay, I just-HAH!" Ryan screamed as he turned the corner, flailing and dropping all the blankets as well as his phone, which thudded to the floor with an unholy crunching noise.

The man from the highway stood in the doorway to the bedroom, equally spooked with his hands up to protect his face. They both froze.

He wasn't quite _in_ the doorway, though. He had to stand just in front of it to avoid hitting his head. He was even taller standing up than he'd seemed as Ryan was struggling to carry him into the house, bridal style. He towered over Ryan, and he had never thought of himself as a short dude.

Ryan broke the silence first.

"You're awake?? And walking??"

The man lowered his arms, but only slightly.

_ "Wo bin ich?" _

"I...what?"

 _"Wo bin ich?"_ he repeated, slower this time.

"Is that...I don't...doesn't matter! You need to sit down, you're hurt! Just...just..." Ryan ran to him and tried to sort of gently push him back into the bedroom. His instinct with someone who might be bleeding internally with every bone in their body broken was to _not_ touch them. Though he wasn't sure where that instinct was earlier.

The stranger wouldn't budge, just stared directly down at him with intense green eyes, challenging him like a cornered animal. Ryan felt caught up all of a sudden, like he was swimming in them, realizing too late he still standing a little too close for comfort.

_ "Wo. Bin. Ich?" _

"Okay, okay then...fine, don't!" Ryan held his hands up and retreated, swiping up the blankets without taking his eyes off the man. "And is that...is that German? Are you German?"

 _"Deutsch? Uhhh ja? Ja. Deutsch. Deutsch Deutsch, das ist mich."_ The man finally broke their gaze, looking around and digging a finger in his ear. 

Ryan frowned. "Oh. Okay? Do you speak English at all...?"

_ "Nein." _

"Espanol?"

 _"Nein, nur Deutsch,"_ he said with a frustrated sigh. He ran a hand through his hair, wincing at the surprising amount of sand that came with.

"That's okay, me neither, not sure why I asked. Listen..." Ryan pushed past him into the bedroom and started to lay the quilts out on the bed, aware of the eyes still firmly at his back. He was trying to stay calm. Act casual. Maybe that'd calm them both down.

"'Wo', that's 'where' right? Um, okay..." He turned to face him and sat down on the corner of the dusty old mattress. "Du...bist...in New Mexico? I'm sorry, I shouldn't get your hopes up, I haven't spoken German since high school. I took two years before someone told me I could just take Spanish for an easy A and the teacher didn't care, but then it turned out I didn't speak Spanish as well as I thought I did, anyway..." Ryan said it all like it was one sentence, scratching the back of his neck.

The stranger's face lightened slightly. _"Immer noch New Mexico. Gut."_

"Yeah it's...really great..." Ryan laughed. "You from around here?" 

"Mmmhm." Shane a noise that sounded mostly like a confirmation.

"Okay?" Ryan said, then shot up. "God, sorry, I'm still just talking at you like you understand a word I'm saying. I'm Ryan by the way! Definitely should have started there. Uh I..." Ryan gestured at himself. "...'m Ryan. Ich heisse Ryan, I remember that much."

"Shane." The man let out a breathy laugh, taking two long strides toward him and extending his hand. Ryan shoot it.

"Shane..." Ryan said dumbly, looking up. Those eyes again. "Hi Shane."

 _"Hallo Ryan."_ Shane gave him a soft, one sided smile, giving his hand one awkward extra shake before dropping it.

"You're probably wondering how you got here and stuff."

_ "Ja." _

"Fuck sorry, English..." Ryan sat back down, but Shane shook his head vigorously. "You...how much are you understanding me?"

_ "Alles." _

"All...all of it. All of it?" Shane gave him a thumbs up. Weird. "Okay? Then uh, I found you in the desert? You...landed...well it seemed like you just kind of fell out of the sky, Shane." Ryan told him, to the best of his ability, about the events of that day. To his surprise, Shane just nodded and rubbed the back of his neck. "Does that...what, sound about right?"

Shane gave him a noncommittal shrug, continuing to look around the shack. _"Lebst du hier oder...?"_

"Lebst?"

 _"Du...hier..."_ The man pointed at Ryan and then gestured around the room. Ryan shook his head.

"Do I live here?" Shane nodded. "No I...ouch? Do I look like I live here?"

The house they stood in was definitely more of a shack. Everything seemed to be made of the same rotting wood, even the sparse furniture. Nothing had been dusted for several presidential administrations. It was clear the owners didn't have any interest in renovating, and who could blame them with this kind of history in every corner. It was exactly what Ryan had been looking for this entire trip, though he wouldn't say he was excited about it.

"No, I'm here...on business."

"Mhmmmm." Shane quirked an eyebrow at him and walked out of the room.

"I am!" Ryan yelled after him. He thought he should probably follow him, make sure he didn't hurt himself. Or steal his shit. It hadn't even occurred to him until that moment that this total stranger might be dangerous. He looked to be about eight feet tall, but he was skinny. Gangly even, with stupidly long limbs and large hands. Probably not so much a threat as a walking reminder to Ryan that he did, in fact, have a type. Unfortunate.

Instead of immediately following the man, Ryan checked his watch, briefly panicked, then started unpacking his equipment for tonight. Audio recorders, an EMF reader, the works. He'd amassed quite the collection in the past few months. If he kept going he'd need a bigger saddlebag. His equipment was steadily encroaching on his food space.

After a minute or so, he heard footsteps approaching him from behind. He sighed. "You alright, big guy? I'd offer to call you an Uber or something, but," At this he held up his phone without looking back. "...the poor guy got crunched pretty bad just now and isn't turning on, which is gonna be fucking great for both of us." He turned to face the other man, who was looking sheepish this time, his hands shoved firmly in his pockets.

_ "Ich...kann nicht mein Handy finden. Hast du es?" _

"Your _what_?"

 _"Mein..."_ Shane pointed to the phone in Ryan's hand.

"Oh. No, I didn't see your phone." Ryan looked over his shoulder at the window. "If it's out there, I don't think you're getting it back."

Shane pointed out the window. _"Kannst du mich fahren? Bevor der Sturm?"_

"The storm is basically here. I don't know if you've ever been in the middle of a dust storm, but trust me, you don't want today to be the day."

Shane's face held steady on the window, his frown slowly relaxing. Ryan went back to work checking his equipment.

"Yeah, sorry, guess you're stuck with me tonight."

The other man finally sighed and looked down at where he was crouched over his pile, and gestured vaguely. Ryan could practically hear the question in it. And just what the fuck is all this?

"It's...my job. I'm a uh..." Ghost hunter on YouTube? "...filmmaker."

Shane picked up a small black box and flipped the switch on it. It emitted a sharp, high pitched electrical noise like a dog whistle. Ryan snickered.

"Yeah that's uh...it's a radio, sort of. But it's broken, so..." He turned back to pull a spare battery out of his bag and was surprised to hear the sound of the reader dissipate and disappear around the corner, Shane with it.

When he got done setting up the bedroom, he found Shane around the corner, sitting at the old, dusty dining table. He had the innards of the box, all screws and sharp glass parts, spread out in front of him as well as Ryan's travel sized toolkit, tinkering with whatever was still in the box itself. He had this intensely focused look on his face, all squinty eyes and tongue in cheek.

"You know what you're doing there, Inspector Gadget?" When he didn't answer, Ryan pulled out a chair across from him and just watched him work in silence for a few minutes. They listened to the wind whip around outside, occasionally throwing bunches of sand at the sealed window. Between the storm and watching Shane's long fingers work their way masterfully around the tiny parts, Ryan felt his stress level slowly sinking.

After a while, just to fill the silence a little, he said, "I guess I'd be concerned, but the warranty on that thing ran out months ago, and I was pretty much just going to scrap it." Shane was now piecing the last bits of it back together. "So, you know, if it still doesn't work, don't feel..."

The small box screamed the second Shane flipped the switch on the top, the distinct noise at full volume. Shane jumped and switched it back off, eyes wide. _"Uhm...entshuligung...ich denke das..."_

"No no!" Ryan snatched it out of the other man's hand before he could open it back up, beaming from ear to ear. "No it's supposed to do that! Thanks man, holy shit..."

 _"Oh. No, es ist nichts. Danke für…"_ Shane started softly, stopped to think, then said _"...mich...hier...bringen. Du weißt"_

Ryan smiled at him. "No problem. I'm glad you're okay." He twisted the volume knob down and handed it back to the man, who stared at it like it had grown legs. "This is fucking great, tonight's gonna be so much better now."

_ "Heute abend? Auch, dein Radio ist kaputt." _

"It's not." Ryan laughed and felt his cheeks heat up. "It's not actually a radio. Not like a 'radio' radio, it's called a spirit box."

Shane raised an eyebrow as the side of his lips twitched. Here we go, Ryan thought.

"So...I wasn't going to get into it, but now since it seems like you aren't going anywhere...and you did me a solid so...well, basically, I'm making a ghost hunting series. I've been on this cross-country ghost hunting adventure, on the last leg of it now, actually." And this is the most consistent in-real-life human interaction I've gotten in a month so sorry if I'm acting like a weirdo, Ryan didn't add.

There was an odd pause between them, which was exactly what Ryan had been trying to avoid. Although, a smile was still playing at the corner of Shane's lips, Ryan could see that. He had that look on his face Ryan was slowly starting to suspect was him trying to think of how to say something in simple German.

 _"Geisterjäger, huh,"_ he said finally.

"Damn, sounds really cool when you say it." Ryan scratched his head. "Ghost hunter, Youtuber...extraordinaire. What about you? What do you do when you're not..." He paused and shook his head as if to shake the memory loose as it rattled around his head. It didn't seem real at this point, with the same man, presumed dead or at least nearly there hours ago, sitting across from him all fine and dandy. "When you're not falling out of the sky, I mean?"

Shane winced and rubbed the back of his neck, remaining silent for a beat. Ryan pressed on. "Is it like security clearance thing, or a translation thing?"

_ "Sicherheit? Nein, auf Deutsch es ist...schwierig..." _

"So definitely not a fallen angel kind of thing?"

That snapped him out of it. Shane coughed out a dry laugh. _"Nein. Und nicht ein Geist. Sie sind nicht echt."_

Ryan wasn't sure what that last part meant, but he pressed on anyway. "Not any sort of...flying cryptid sort? Mothman?"

_ "Was ist ein Motteman?" _

"Nevermind...so you fell out of a plane or something?"

Shane held his hand level to the floor and jiggled it, a universal sign of "Sorta kinda?"

"Sort of a plane?"

_ "Mmmmm? Ja?" _

"Small or large?"

_ "Klein." _

"Like a single-seater? Holy shit, are you a pilot?"

He noncommittally used the "sorta kinda" hand jiggle motion again.

"Okay?" he looked down at the toolbox. "A pilot...mechanic sort of thing?"

Shane grinned and shrugged. _"Pilot. Mechaniker. Und Wissenschaftler! Mit dem..."_ he indicated out the window. _"...Wetter."_

"Oh. A...pilot...mechanic...meteorologist?"

Shane leaned his head in his fist and...hand jiggle.

"Fucking..." Ryan laughed and slapped the table. "I really thought you were some kind of German spy, but I'm pretty sure any spy alive would be able to lie better than that." Shane raised his eyebrows. "I'm not stupid, man. I get it if you can't tell me, but if you at any point decide you can, fucking do it. I wanna know. I wanna know everything. And I can keep a secret. I hunt ghosts for a living, you think anyone would believe me if I told them anything?"

Shane's smile was slow but warm. "Okay, Bergara." He picked up the spirit box once again, playing with the volume knob. _"Also, sie in hier?"_ Shane turned up the volume just enough to hear the sputtered radio noises, raising an eyebrow.

"Are who what?"

 _"Die Geister...sind sie in hier?"_ He pointed to the box, a laugh starting in his eyes. _"Behältst du sie hier drin...wie Bill Murray? Oder Danny Phantom?"_

Ryan recognized the awkward change of subject but couldn't help taking the bait. He'd never met someone so casually infuriating.

"Fuck you." Ryan giggled despite himself. "I'm a ghost hunter, not ghostbuster. I'm hunting for _evidence_. You don't believe in any of it, do you?"

Shane shook his head and flashed him an impish grin, turning up the volume ever so slightly on the spirit box. A frantic mess of static and jumbled voices came pouring out.

_ "Ist das ihnen? Sie klingen wütend, Ryan!" _

"What? Okay look," Ryan grabbed the spirit box back. "People think...they theorize that ghosts can manipulate its energy and say things through it. It cycles through 10 stations a second, so if you hear something come out of it that sounds like a whole word, maybe even a sentence, that's pretty unlikely right?"

_ "Unwahrscheinlich. Somit. Muss ein Geist sein." _

"I could show you footage! Well...later, I'll show you later. I'm trying to preserve battery on my laptop until I get to the hotel..." he paused. "Not that you'll...be there by then." Shane just responded by winking at him, green eyes alight with mischief. Ryan decided to put that just to the side of his mind, for now. All this first date energy really needed to stop distracting him, he was technically at work. As he got up from the table, he picked up the spirit box and continued, "I've heard shit come out of this thing you wouldn't believe."

_ "Ja, würde nicht." _

Ryan grinned. "You know you're acting really cocky for a guy about to spend the night in a haunted house."

\---

Ryan knew he needed to do a sweep of the house first for filler footage, and that he didn't have time to do it well. Grumbling to himself, he haphazardly tried to set up his primary camera to record and set the secondary one on the tripod at the same time. He hesitated, then looked back at Shane, who was still watching him from the table, sipping from a water bottle and looking bored.

"You know how to use a camera?" The man nodded. "You wanna help?"

Five minutes later, against his better judgment, he watched his new giraffe-legged friend walk off toward the kitchen, camera held surprisingly steady and sweeping in the slow way Ryan had showed him. Ryan let out a sigh of relief and took off in the other direction, towards the stairs.

The attic was everything he was hoping for and _not_ hoping for. Every stair creaked and groaned on the way up. Shadows slithered around like they'd just woken up from a long slumber, looking at him from every corner. Ryan hated it. He swallowed and walked further down the hallway. To the camera, he said "This bedroom up here is said to-"

He froze. Talking. Someone was speaking. Muffled, full sentences emanated from the room at the end.

Ryan stepped as quietly as he could toward the chatter, every step feeling like lead on stone. Every time, every single time something like this happened he struggled to remember why this was his job. It felt like his stomach was in his throat.

"Am I crazy? Or am I already hearing people talking up here?" he narrated to the camera in a soft whisper.

It stopped. Of course it did. A knot in his stomach tightened as he cracked the door an inch, the old hinges making the loudest sound known to man. "Hello?" It came out a strained. Then...

It started laughing.

Ryan sucked in a breath, squinted his eyes, and swung the door open. Nothing. No one. But the laughter...

It was coming from the corner of the small room. There was an air vent on the floor. And Ryan could tell now that it was a man's voice. A familiar man's voice. Not up here. Down there.

Ryan raced down the hallway, vaulted down the stairs, missing most of them. Shane, eyes wide, walked in to meet him from the kitchen.

"Did you find something?"

_ "Nein?" _

Ryan gaped at him, then tried to look around him. Too tall, though. "Who were you talking to?"

_ "Niemand." _

A beat. "I heard you talking?" Shane just shook his head.

All of the excited air left Ryan at once. He frowned at the other man, waiting for that guilty give away. The broken eye contact, the nervous tick. But Shane just gave him a small smile and a lazy shrug.

On autopilot, Ryan switched off his camera, which gave him an idea. The camera in Shane's hands had a small red light on top, indicating that he had actually been recording. He nodded towards it. "You think you got enough footage?"

To his surprise, the other man nodded and easily handed it back to him.

 _Worst spy in the world,_ Ryan thought.

\---

"Alright, we're rolling in 3, 2..."

Ryan sat down on the bed clapped in front of the camera lens, in lieu of a clapperboard. Shane smiled from his seat behind the camera and mimicked his clap.

_ "Aktion!" _

"Welcome to Unsolved: On the Road, a coast to coast tour of the everyday supernatural mysteries hidden in the small towns of the continental United States, as a part of my ongoing attempt to, say it with me now: Solve the unsolved!"

From the corner of his eye, Shane was visibly stifling a laugh. Ryan paused. 

"What?" He knew this was going to be hard to edit if he kept glancing off to the side.

_ "Nichts...du habst ein lang Intro..." _

"What was that?" Ryan reached up and swiveled the tripod around to face him. "If you're gonna commentate, you're gonna be on camera."

Shane stared wide-eyed into the camera for a second. It looked like he was running calculations.

 _"...ja?"_ he said finally.

"Yeah, I mean," Ryan thought for a second. "If you actually wanted to be a guest, you could," He patted the bed next to him. "I've had a few on this trip. Mostly the owners of the places, but I used to have a regular guest host, until he bailed on me."

Shane remained silent, still looking at the camera. Seeming to make up his mind, he nodded, then grinned wildly. _"Du machest mir ein Filmstar?"_ he said, placing his hand on his chest.

"Yeah big guy, we’ll see." He scooted over to make room. Shane sat down gingerly, and Ryan held his hands up again, pausing. "I'll...just put subtitles over you later?" Shane shrugged.

"Mkay, intro take 2, rolling in 3, 2..."

He recited the intro again, which once again made Shane crack up.

"You guys know me, but this guy is uh..."

 _"Shane, hallo YouTube!"_ Shane waved, then gave a thumbs up. _"Bitte gib uns ein groß 'Like'!"_

It was Ryan's turn to laugh. "Cool, he's already got the hang of it. As you might be able to tell, my new friend doesn't speak a word of English, but since I speak approximately 3 words in German, we've uh, made it work?"

Shane perked up at that. _"Gib mir ein."_ He held up one finger.

"One word in German? Gib, mir, ein, that's three."

_ "Neu Wort." _

"Very demanding of you. Well, this is what I remember from 2 years of vocab tests in high school, are you ready?"

_ "Sag 'm" _

"Senf."

Shane wheezed. _"Nur senf, huh?"_

"Nur senf. That's 'mustard' for all you...non-German-speaking Boogaras out there."

"BOO-garas??" Shane was now covering his mouth and shaking. It was so adorable, Ryan never wanted him to stop. _"Was ist das, Ryan..."_

"Yup those are my MANY fans you're insulting," Ryan pointed at the camera. He could feel himself grinning like an idiot. He could feel himself leaning into this, whatever it was. Maybe he'd just forgotten how fun it was to do the show opposite someone with a sense of humor. It'd been a while.

"Alright," Ryan pulled his notes out of his bag. "Let's get into the history of this place. Unless you wanna keep talking about mustard?"

_ "Ich konnte uber Senf den ganzen Tag reden." _

"I don't know what that meant, but just gonna go ahead and say hard no from me, dog. Anyway..."

He went on to tell the story of Harold and Jane Costello, who had built the house in 1912.

"What they wanted to be doing out in the middle of nowhere is unknown..."

_ "Heroin, wahrscheinlich." _

"Heroin??" Ryan couldn't help but set his notes back down on his lap and let out a sharp barking laugh. Shane was going to have him going all night, and from the proud-of-himself look on his face, that was 100% his intention. "I don't know where you think you are, but this is definitely meth country."

Shane gasped. _"Ich liebe Breaking Bad."_

Ryan smiled and shook his head. "God damn it. Me too buddy. Anyway..."

\---

It took twice as long as usual to get through the setup. The sun was setting by the time they actually got around to the ghost hunting portion of this ghost hunting show. Ryan didn't really mind. The episodes he had the most fun filming (or the least fun) usually ended up being fan favorites. And he was having, maybe, too much fun with this weird dude.

"Is there anyone here tonight that would like to speak with us?" Ryan said, followed by several seconds of silence. He sat uncomfortably on the floor with his back against a wall in the upstairs bedroom. Shane sat cross legged several feet away, camera in hand trained on Ryan. "Jane? Are you here with us tonight?"

 _"Harold? Bist du da?"_ Shane called into the dark. After a moment of waiting, he looked back at Ryan. _"Das spürt dumm, Ryan."_

"What's dumb?"

 _"...nichts."_ Shane chuckled and hand waved him away.

"Whatever."

There was a loud knock from across the room. Ryan felt his heart skip a beat. "Harold? Are you responding to what he said?" A second knock made Ryan's breathe catch. It was too dark to see the other side of the room. He glanced over to where Shane was, only to see the night vision camera still firmly pointed in his own direction.

"Are you not even going to pan over? I can take that back."

_ "Nein, ich filme dich gern. _Hier_ ist wo das Geld is. Wo das Brot gebuttert ist." _

"Can you not?" Ryan said, laughing. He'd only understood "money" and "buttered bread", but he got the gist. Heat creeped up the back of his neck and a smile played at his lips. He was glad for the cover of darkness. So much for dispelling the first date energy.

The knocks stopped completely after that. After an hour of trying to communicate the old fashioned way, he finally pulled out the spirit box.

"AIUAUJSNDJUD..." it screamed from its perch on a stool in the middle of the empty bedroom.

"My name is Ryan, this is Shane." He gestured, and the other man waved half-heartedly from where he crouched. Something about his annoyed expression as he looked at the box made Ryan want to keep it on all night. "Can you say your name?"

"WJEJNSN ICH SKBRYSU BIN..."

Ryan's ears perked up. "Ich bin? Ich bin what? Is that why you haven't been communicating, you speak German? This is so weird, oh my god dude!" He turned to Shane, who looked unimpressed. "They speak German!"

_ "Kuhl." _

"Say something in German!"

Without hesitating, Shane turned the stool and said _"Senf."_

"Fuck you." Ryan said, a grin growing on his face of its own accord.

But before the second word left his lips, the spirit box spit out a quick, and loud, "SENF!!"

Ryan jumped like his soul left his body. Shane quirked an eyebrow and started to smile a wicked smile.

 _"Geist, ist das du?"_ Shane rose to his feet, towering over the spirit box. _"Bist du hier für mich?"_ He pointed at himself.

"SJLAOENEJ KILL DOSOOAPPSJHHEHEH"

"Kill??" Ryan squeaked as he started to back away slowly, until his back hit the wall.

_ "Ja? Du will mich sterben? Hmm Herr Geist?" _

"TOIAKANDJRUJJ AOSOSJEJSIUDJJJDK"

 _"Nein, wo gehst du? Sterb mich!"_ He opened his arms, inviting. _"Isst mein Herz! Ich habe mehr!"_

"Holy shit dude." Ryan couldn't help but gape. He couldn't translate exactly, but the message was clearly some form of "Come at me spirits, you won't!" The balls on this guy. But then again...

"You still think you're talking to nothing?"

Shane looked over at him. _"Ja, Ryan, es ist nichts,"_ he said calmly, breaking the spell. He winked again.

Somewhere below them, a door slammed shut, so hard they could feel it through the floor. Ryan had to quickly cover his mouth to keep from screaming. Even Shane jumped. Terrified as Ryan was, he was thrilled he got that on camera.

But his face went right back, grinning devilishly and as he turned back to saunter around the room.

 _"Warst das du? Wir sind hier oben! Mach schon!"_ He stomped on the floor for emphasis. _"Zuhalten mein Mund!"_

"LLFKDKJSJS brrrrrrr..."

They both looked back down at the spirit box, which had seemingly stopped flipping through channels and was now only producing static. Ryan let out a heavy sigh of relief.

"I think that's all she wrote, folks," he said to camera.

Shane looked at him, smiling with wild eyes. _"Ich denke sie haben Angst vor mir."_

"You think they're scared of you?" Shane nodded. "I think I'm scared of you."

_ "Sol ich halten?" _

"No it's okay," Ryan breathed. "This is more action than I've seen in months."

\---

After filming wrapped, Ryan needed to decompress. Backup camera in hand, he sat out on the back steps of the porch and rewound the footage. The wind had finally died down, and what was left just occasionally kicked up some sand at his bare feet. He pressed play and watched himself pop up first. Camera-him frowned, reached up to press a button, then laughed.

"Yep, mic wasn't on! Not that you'll need it, but-"

_ "Oh, ich werde." _

Present-Ryan watched camera-Ryan walk up the stairs as the camera panned around to face its holder. Shane stuck out his tongue.

 _"Geeeeist?"_ The man did actually do what was asked of him after that. The sweeping establishing shots he got, while maybe a little high up, looked as good as they needed to. They just happened to also come with some running commentary.

 _"Geist? Wo bist du? Bist du in hieeeer? Oder-?"_ The camera stopped suddenly in front of the old fireplace and sank down. _"Herr Geist?"_

When the camera finally focused, it was trained on a dead rat lying far back in the fireplace. Shane started to giggle.

 _"Herr Geist! Du gut? Hast du-AH!"_ The camera leapt backward, stumbling as Shane dissolved into giggles that very quickly turned into uproarious laughter. Ryan had to rewind the footage several times, the smile on his face growing every time, to finally figure out that the rat's back leg had twitched. 

_"Ratten sind echt, Ryan,"_ came a voice from behind him. Ryan shut off the camera.

"You could've just said, 'Oh sorry I scared you, I was laughing at a _dead rat_. Like a _creep_.' Is that my special-occasion-only Mike's Hard Lemonade?" 

Shane held an open bottle out to him with a small laugh. _"Ich habe es schon geöffnet."_

He sat down with his own bottle in hand, giving it a quick sniff and a frown. Ryan chuckled. He could already feel the stress and tension of the night melting away from him. Only 3AM too. Not bad timing, after all.

"What, you don't fuck with Mike?" Shane just directed his frown at Ryan.

_ "Schlect Bier." _

"It's...not beer? Beer gets all stanky if you're not careful with the temperature in your bag. And I don't always get to control the temp when I'm on the road. In the _desert_." Ryan said. As he sat back, he took a long, thoughtful swig of the warm adult candy water. "I guess we can say we're celebrating some of the best evidence I've captured on this little road trip of mine."

 _"Das war die Besten?"_ Ryan nodded. _"Und nicht den Wind. Geister. Nicht..."_ Shane smiled and gestured vaguely at the expanse in front of them, sand still restlessly kicking up in spots. _"Der Wind. Währen eines Sturms."_

"Whatever, weather man. I've never heard the wind slam a door that hard on _command_." Ryan watched Shane take a suspicious sip of lemonade, think about it for a second, before swirling it around his mouth like mouthwash, swallowing happily. "You know you're a weird dude, right?" 

_ "Ja klar." _

"Which like," Ryan ran a hand through his hair and leaned all the way back on his elbows. "Probably should've figured out when you fell from an airplane and survived without a parachute? Like even with all the spy gadgets in the world, I don't get how you did that."

 _"Ich bin kein Geheimagent. Du hast es früher gesagt. Ich bin..."_ Shane paused for dramatic effect, then slowly turned to Ryan, whispering _"Der Wetterman."_

"That's not-" Ryan threw back his head and laughed, the tip of his bottle clinking into his teeth. "Is that your fucking superhero name?"

_ "Ja, ich mag es." _

"Well then you can tell me how you did it, right?" Ryan giggled into his lemonade before tossing it back again. "And why you seem to understand English perfectly but act like you can't even say, like, one word? Like, 'yes'?"

_ "Nein." _

"What? See!"

 _"Ich will. Er..."_ Shane turned back to peer out into the expanse in front of them, thinking. Ryan couldn't read his expression.

They left it at that for several minutes, silently watching the warm desert wind throw the sand this way and that and sipping the last of the lemonade. Ryan was just about to call it a night and go to bed when finally, quietly, Shane said _"Wenn du wissen willst, werde ich dir sagen."_

Ryan sat up and Shane turned to him again, saying _"Später."_

He paused, opened his mouth, closed it again. Then, "Later??" It was pretty much the only thing he got out of that.

 _"Ja,"_ Shane laughed uneasily but grinned wide, eyes crinkling at the corners. _"Auf Englisch."_

It was the first time Ryan had seen his face so wide open and lovely. It was now closer to 4AM, the sun would be up soon, and yet he felt wide awake. Electricity had been building and building in his veins all day, to the point where now he could barely look at the man, even though that's all he wanted to do.

What he really wanted right then was to kiss him. The feeling took him by surprise, but it shouldn't have. His cheeks practically hurt from laughing at the man's stupid jokes all night and he was almost high on it. He hadn't had this much fun on a shoot the entire time he'd been on the road. Of course he wanted to kiss him.

Their faces were close together now, they'd stopped talking a while ago, and Shane had a look in his eye. He glanced down at Ryan's lips and back up again, seemingly having the same thought. It sent a spark down his spine.

But the world around them exploded. One second the desert was a quiet, serene, well, desert. In the next, buckets of water came pouring down from the sky. It came straight down like someone had turned on a faucet all the way up.

It was so sudden both men jumped back from each other and stared out from the covered porch.

"That's...unusual," Ryan had to speak louder to be heard over the downpour. He glanced back toward the door. But that was dumb, he realized. Spirits couldn't control the weather. At least he'd never heard of it happening, but then again…

_Should I get my camera...?_

Shane hadn't said anything for several moments, staring out into the expanse, transfixed with his lips parted slightly, eyes saucers.

 _"Sie functioniert,"_ he finally said, so quietly Ryan had barely heard him.

"What?"

Before the syllable had fully formed in his mouth, Shane was off. He launched himself from the steps out into the pouring rain with a shout. 

"Shane!" Ryan leapt up to follow him automatically, almost getting knocked to the ground by the heavy rain as soon as he stepped out. But Shane was...

Shane was dancing. Pumping his fist in the air and yell-singing something that sounded like an Irish jig, as Irish as German could sound, anyway. Ryan realized as he got closer that the lyrics were just those same two words over and over, _"Sie functioniert, sie functioniert!"_ sang with the most wild, gleeful grin Ryan had ever seen on his face. 

It was infectious. He didn't know the reason behind this rain dance, but he didn't need one. When in Rome. 

"Sie functioniert, baby!!" Ryan shouted, throwing up his hands and jumping around like it was a rave. He almost tripped in the wet sand.

The second Shane saw him, he snatched him up in a crushing hug, which turned into picking him up and spinning him around like he weighed less than nothing. Ryan screamed. Then Shane did slip, tumbling backwards with the other man in tow down into the sand, which was now more mud than sand.

Ryan landed on top of him and stayed there, gripping the other man around middle and laughing into his neck.

"What're we doing?" he breathed between gasps.

 _"Entschuldigung,"_ Shane said softly near his ear, sounding like all the air had been knocked out of him. Even so, Ryan could still hear the unbridled joy there. It made him want to drink it in. _"Ich kann nicht sagen."_

"'Course not." 

He kissed him. His lips were so warm under him he almost pulled back in surprise. His hand was on the back of Ryan's neck so quick, he probably had the same idea at the same time. It only felt like a proper first kiss for maybe a few seconds. Second one was a cautious, "Is this ok?" sort of thing, the next was a more exploratory, tongues sliding around each other, and the next, no holds barred. A grasping, gasping, desperate thing spurred on by the driving rain on his back. He was so far gone already, and not about to stop to think about it.

Then the rain picked up. Ryan had thought it was raining hard before, but now it was fully beating on his back like a bunch of tiny fists. He dragged Shane up to his feet, and pulled him by the hand back towards the porch with some effort. They were both up to their ankles in what felt like quicksand.

_Am I gonna drown in this desert?_

He looked back at Shane. Though he could barely see through the haze of the rain, he could tell he was grinning like an idiot.

So, so gone.

They collapsed in a heap on the porch steps, just under the overhang, panting like they'd just run a marathon.

"It's like the fucking end times out there." Ryan said, chest heaving against the other man's.

 _"Entschuldigung,"_ Shane said from above him, his hair sticking to his forehead and his hands braced on either side of Ryan's head. The softness of it made butterflies flare up in Ryan's stomach.

"You can keep saying that, it still doesn't mean anything to me." Ryan pulled him by the neck back in for another bruising kiss, right where they left off. He almost laughed when he felt Shane's back, caked in wet sand as it was.

Shane was the first one to break it off, only to nod towards the door with the smallest smile, enhanced by how kiss-swollen his lower lip looked. Ryan's heart raced. One of his hands rested gently just under Ryan's shirt, and it was all Ryan could do not to shiver.

Ryan opened his mouth to say something, closed it, then opened it again to say "Can't."

His face fell a little, but he nodded and started to get up.

"No wait, I-!" Ryan grabbed his arm. "Just-! Not in front of the ghosts!"

For a long moment they just looked at each other. Shane finally broke the silence, dissolving into giggles.

_ "Bist du im Ernst? Gott, du bist…ich...Scheisse..." _

Ryan thought he'd ruined everything for a second, until Shane kissed him again, leaned back and said _"Hier?"_

He pulled ever so slightly on Ryan's belt loop, then looked him in the eyes as he thumbed a line over his own lips. Ryan swallowed and looked over his shoulder at the curtain of rain around him, before unceremoniously ripping Shane's shirt over his head, followed closely by his own. Once again, Shane was so warm against him that it bordered on being too much for Ryan's already flushed skin.

"Here's good."

There was virtually nothing out past the porch, just an expanse of sand almost to the horizon. Realistically nobody was going to spot them on the stairs, especially not through the rain. But still. Ryan was stuck wondering whether it was that thought, of someone or something out there catching them (or worse, the owner of the shack doing a random drop in) that had him hard already. Exhibitionism had never been one of his things. Granted, it could also be the weirdly hot European guy currently trying to relieve him of his soaking wet pants, and trying unsuccessfully to hide how much it was making him laugh.

It wasn't the first time he'd hooked up with someone. It wasn't even the first time on this trip. But he'd never had a hook-up make him want to re-examine his _things_.

Shane caught his eye and gave him another of his trademark mischievous smiles, right before taking him into all the way into his mouth. The immediate heat of it made Ryan cry out.

Could definitely be both.

\---

Ryan woke up first, just a few hours later, to the alarm on his watch. He sat up and stretched in the too-small bed and looked over at the man next to him, face down in the pillow.

"I can't believe we did that." He saw the corner of Shane's mouth turn up. Decidedly not sleeping, then.

The night before, he'd been on the receiving end of a blowjob so toe-curlingly good that it had temporarily cured him of any ghost-related fears, and in return he’d pulled the other man into the house and out of his wet clothes. What was left of them, anyway.

 _"Zweimal,"_ Shane said into the pillow.

"What? No-" One large hand came out from under the blankets, landed on Ryan's chest, and pushed him back down onto the bed. He laughed and swatted it away. "Nope, no....zweimal...we've gotta get going. I've gotta get the keys to this place back to the owner before noon, then I've gotta find a motel with some decent internet and a shower...God, I need a shower...and then..." 

He paused, letting himself indulge in the soft, lazy kisses Shane was placing on his neck for just a couple more seconds before climbing out of bed and pulling on a clean pair of pants. "And then somewhere in that time frame I've gotta take you to...wherever I'm taking you."

He felt a pang in his chest that he tried his best to ignore. He'd always hated goodbyes, especially ones like these, where there was zero chance of them crossing paths again.

Shane didn't seem to notice. He stretched his impossibly long arms over his head and yawned. _"Erste, mein Handy."_

Ryan paused, frowning. "Sure man, I mean, we can look for it. But I'd be really surprised if it wasn't like, swallowed up by the sand storm. Or the rain! It fucking rained _so much_ last night!" 

_"Ich weiss,"_ his eyes shone a little. He got up and stretched his long arms over his head. Ryan blushed and threw clothes at him. Hopefully something of his would fit.

The cleanup was always sobering after a long night of ghost hunting, but adding to it this time was all the things he had to pick up, ring out, and wrap up in big nasty wad.

Ringing out the last of it over the side of the back porch, he looked out across the plain. Blue skies for miles, dotted only occasionally with white wisps and black birds, met in a perfect straight line of brown sand, now darker with wetness but drying quickly under the blazing sun. Ryan breathed it all in and closed his eyes, waiting for that old, familiar feeling to creep back into his heart. The one that made him feel like he was a tiny drop in a gigantic ocean. He smiled to himself when it didn't come at all.

 _"Das ist alles. Hungrig?"_ Ryan could hear Shane behind him shoving clothes into a saddlebag.

He turned. "Starving." Shane looked up from his crouching position, smiling his easy smile, and tossed a protein bar to him. "Well that's...technically dinner for tonight, but whatever."

They chewed in silence for a minute as Ryan's thoughts finally settled.

"Are you...really from around here?"

Shane gave him that same sad, you're-not-ready-for-this-conversation look that Ryan had come to recognize as such, but after a few moments, finally just answered with just _"Nein."_

"That's fine. Ever been to California?" It felt like the most dangerous thing he could say, followed by the one thing that could top it: "Would you like to?"

It was worth it to see the sun reflected in Shane's bright eyes, his entire face lit up like a Christmas tree. Then, he looked out into the desert as if he needed its permission. Ryan couldn't tell what it was saying back.

Before he could answer, a knock came from the front door. Ryan frowned at it. Not only had he not heard a car pull up to the shack, he didn't think he'd ever seen another car on this road. 

Shane's face fell immediately. That sullen expression stuck in Ryan's mind as he led the way back through the house and peeked through the peephole. Which, for this house, was just a small hole drilled in the door.

Two big men stood side by side, in black suits that matched each other but not the environment. He thought for a second they might be Jehovah's witnesses or something, except they didn't carry any books, and as he squinted longer he thought they might actually be loaded.

 _The FBI? CIA?? Secret service??_ His mind helpfully provided. But they weren't so much what his logical side thought FBI agents would look like. More like what would be written into a bad police procedural. They even had the sunglasses.

He looked back at Shane, but could see immediately that the man didn't need to be told what was on the other side of the door. He looked almost grey, like he'd lost all the color in his face in the walk over. His wide eyes implored Ryan with everything he knew he couldn't say, all that he knew he couldn't make Ryan understand. 

The men knocked once more, harder this time. He had a feeling they wouldn't do it again. He looked from Shane to the doorknob and back again, heart pounding. 

Ryan could count the number of times he'd broken the law on one hand. That is, not counting any drug related crimes that were legal now legal in his home state. He didn't even drink before he turned 21, something that almost kept him from being inducted into his frat. He didn't even like to speed, because every time he did, he imagined somewhere his mother's spidey senses were tingling. He was never one to disappoint his mother.

Despite that, there was no question in his mind now. It wasn't a hard decision, but still, a decision. He looked Shane at again and...started to strip.

He threw his shirt over his head and as he worked on his belt, he nodded back in the direction they'd come, mouthing "Go, meet you back there."

Shane stood frozen in place with his mouth hanging open for a minute. He looked like he wanted to say something, but ultimately decided not to. Then he very quickly and quietly walked back toward the porch. Once he'd turned the corner and was out of sight, Ryan threw open the door, wearing nothing but his boxer briefs.

"Hey, you...ah!" he said, putting on his best-worst flirty voice until he saw them, then slamming the door in their faces.

"Sorry!" he said to the door. "I thought you were somebody else..."

"That's...okay sir, can you open the door? We just want to ask you some questions." The deep, booming voice that came from it nearly vibrated the wood between them. Ryan cracked it open just enough to stick his head out. He hoped the very real blush forming on his cheeks was going to help sell this.

The man on the left extended his hand and said "I'm Officer Hill, this is my partner Officer Gansey."

Ryan reached around the door to shake Hill's absurdly large, meaty hand. He offered his hand to Gansey too, but had to awkwardly retract it when the man just stared him down. Now that he could see them more clearly, he thought they could've been twins. They had matching builds and military-style haircuts, though Hill's hair was slightly darker. Their eyes were hidden behind reflective shades.

"I'm Ricky." The lie miraculously came out of his mouth without any hesitation. "Can I...help you?"

"I'll cut right to the chase, as we don't have much time, Ricky." Ryan didn't like the way the man said his fake name. From his breast pocket, he pulled out a piece of printer paper and unfolded it. It was a large black and white picture, a crowd shot that looked like it was taken of a very busy street, somewhere like New York or Chicago. In the center, a very familiar face was circled.

"We're looking for this man. He was last spotted just a few miles east of here. Have you seen him?"

"Umm." Ryan leaned out of the doorframe, squinting at the tiny circle. It was Shane, alright, although his hair was shorter and he was totally clean shaven. It was the nose that gave him away. And the fact that he towered over everyone else around him. "I don't think so? But I'm not from around here sir, just passing through..."

Hill folded up the picture and returned it to his pocket, expression unchanged. "That's just fine. Unfortunately, we will need to search the house. I want you to understand, he’s a very dangerous criminal." The emphasis on the last three words almost made Ryan give the game away. He had to swallow a laugh, which made him have to cough.

"Um..." he glanced behind him. "I don't...this isn't actually my house, I'm just staying here...legally, obviously! I mean, the owner..."

"We have a warrant."

"Ah, okay, yep." Ryan shuffled then looked back up at him. "Just...let me find my pants, alright?"

"Thank you," Hill said calmly, the ever cool cucumber. Gansey hadn't spoken or even moved the entire time, as far as Ryan could tell.

"And Rickey?" he said as Ryan had the door nearly closed. He looked out again. Ryan swallowed.

Hill gave him the first hint of a smile he'd seen from him. It looked...unnatural, like he'd never used those muscles before. "You're not in trouble."

Ryan gave a weak smile back and a thumbs up, instantly sweating despite the lack of a threat in his words. He finally closed the door, managing to turn the lock just as it latched, so there was no extra sound.

He'd never gotten dressed so fast in his life, stumbling into his jeans while moving and getting his shirt back over his head just as he passed the threshold to the back porch.

Shane tossed him his helmet from where he stood behind Ryan's bike. His movements were deliberately cool, calm, and collected but his eyes gave him away. They still held that cornered animal look, though Ryan was glad to see the color returned to his cheeks.

Ryan handed the helmet back to him as he approached. "You wear it, the terminators back there are after _you_." he insisted quietly. They needed to hide his face. But Shane shook his head quickly mimed something that Ryan understood to mean "Won't fit, head too big" and handed it back to him.

So Ryan begrudgingly slid it onto his own head and flipped down the shield. "We'll get you something to fit that big noggin as soon as we can," he said to the inside of his helmet, more for his own sake than anything. "You better fucking hold on tight."

Shane grabbed him on either side of the helmet and met him in the middle, over the motorcycle seat. He placed a kiss to the middle of the shield before quickly wiping it clean. He stared into it with all the intensity of a thousand desert suns, and Ryan understood.

"Let's go."

_And get out of here alive, somehow._

\---

They walked around the side of the house, both struggling to push the bike through the sand. It was now weighed down with all of Ryan's belongings, but luckily for them, the sand had dried and baked in blazing morning heat, leaving a smooth layer of what looked like brown freshly fallen snow. Unluckily, it was hot as hell. Ryan was now pouring sweat down his back from a combination of the effort it was taking, the thick layer of clothing he wore to ride, and the anxiety playing at the edge of his mind that he wouldn't let himself fully look at straight on. Not yet.

When they were about halfway around, they heard a crash from within the house. They both winced. It was the telltale sound of the front door being kicked in, followed by heavy stomping inside the house. Ryan let out a breath he'd been holding and started pushing harder. They weren't in the clear yet, but the two men searching the house would buy them just a little bit more time.

"Faster!" he hissed, more to himself than anyone. He wasn't sure if Shane heard him through the helmet.

They finally cleared the side of the house and, feeling every bit exposed, to the pavement. The officers had a jet black car parked on the side of the road, yet another thing seemingly plucked straight from Ryan's own imagination. He thought as much as they crouched behind it, taking a moment to catch their breath.

With his eyes trained on the front door of the shack, Shane reached blindly into a side pocket of one of the saddlebags and pulled out the only weapon Ryan owned: a tiny pocket knife. Ryan thought he should probably wonder how he knew exactly where it was in the bag, but instead he couldn't help but be charmed when Shane angled it against the car's back right tire. It didn't help that Shane looked at him and gave him a wry, knowing smile. He couldn't believe this was the idiot he was going to get killed over. His mom would be so disappointed.

The tire made a loud popping sound, piercing the quiet air around them. Shane's expression instantly fell. There was suddenly shouting from within the house.

"That's our cue!" Ryan jumped on his motorcycle which revved to life under him. The second he felt Shane's arms clasped around his waist he squeezed the accelerator all the way down. The tires screamed and they were off like a shot. There was a moment where they very nearly toppled over, only just getting their combined center of gravity where it needed to be.

He didn't dare look back after that. He heard gunfire and glass breaking behind him, quickly followed by the sound of the car engine, tires spinning, sand flying, metal scraping pavement, even more gunshots. He tightened his grip on the accelerator. All he could do is focus on Shane's arms around him, waiting and praying they didn't loosen their grip any time soon.

Five of the longest, most agonizing minutes of his life later, he finally let himself relax his white-knuckled grip on the handlebars. He couldn't hear the car anymore, though it was hard to tell over the sound of his own engine and the blood pumping in his ears.

After ten, Shane's grip loosened around him and he heard him shout something. Ryan immediately pulled them to shaky stop, throwing off his helmet and turning.

"Are you okay??"

Shane got off without answering, and ran off the side of the road and into the sand. Ryan just gaped at him from his perch on the still running motorcycle.

"Shane?"

He'd been so sure the first time he looked back that he'd see Shane bloody and bullet-ridden, but he appeared to be fine. He fell to his knees and frantically started digging his hands into the smooth sand.

Ryan frowned. "FUCK Shane, if this is about your stupid fucking cell phone, I'm leaving you here!" Shane didn't look up, but instead gestured for Ryan to come over. 

Ryan lifted his head and screamed in frustration. He still had at least a day's worth of adrenaline pumping through his veins. When he held up one of his hands, it was visibly shaking.

What had he just done? He glanced behind him. Still no sign of the agents, but there was no doubt in his mind they'd be here soon enough. He could leave. He really could. If they found their guy on the side of the road, helpless with nothing but his shirt on his back? Like handing him over on a silver platter? They probably wouldn't even arrest Ryan. If they did he could say oh, he had a knife to my throat, I swear! His knife did have the guy's fingerprints on it now...

Instead, Ryan took a deep breath and turned the key in the ignition. He walked over to where Shane was still digging and threw the helmet at his back like a basketball. Shane didn't even flinch. It hit the ground with a dull thud.

"Find it yet? We should proooobably get going again. I don't know if you heard, but there's some assholes with _guns_ who would very much like to use them on you..."

 _"Ja!!"_ Shane shouted as he triumphantly held his treasure to the sky.

Ryan squinted at it. It didn't look like any phone he'd ever seen. It was thick and blocky, black all over with no discernible screen. Shane brought it back down and as Ryan watched over his shoulder, popped a small compartment open and shook out the contents.

He stood up and faced Ryan, showing him his hand. In it was a tiny, round piece of either plastic or glass with wires running through it. He didn't recognize it as anything until Shane reached into his own ear, frowned, and pulled out an identical one. Identical, except for the very obvious crack running through the one that came from his ear.

Ryan took a step back, an uneasy nauseous feeling rising from his stomach. "You...God, _are_ you a spy? Fuck shit, Shane..." He didn’t want to be here anymore. He wished immediately he’d kept his bike running, and his helmet on.

Shane looked at him with eyebrows raised, shaking his head and holding up his hand. Then, slowly, as if he were trying to put him at ease, he raised the new earpiece to his ear and slide it in with one finger. It went deeper than Ryan would've expected, making him shudder.

Shane shook his head from side to side, tapping his temple with his palm as if testing for swimmer's ear. Then he let out the deepest, most content sigh, closing his eyes.

"Fuck, that's so much better! You have no idea how annoying that was."

Ryan stood there, frozen in place. It took his brain a few seconds to register the speech as English.

Shane continued, holding up his hand again. "Please don't freak out."

"How? How am I not supposed to freak out Shane? You don't even have a stupid accent!" Ryan's voice rose even as Shane calmly went back to messing with his cell phone. When he tapped the middle of it, the entire front part lit up like a screen, which at least solved one mystery. After a few button presses, three more items came tumbling out of the compartment and into Shane's hand. He held his other hand out towards Ryan.

"Give me your arm."

"I think the fuck not!" Ryan said, stepping back. He thought he heard the far off sound of a car engine, but hoped it was some kind of desert mirage. But with sound. Somehow.

A second later he was certain he heard it, and it was getting louder.

"Ryan, please. Please trust me on this one," the desperate look was returning to the other man's eyes, this time tinged with sadness. Something about it gave Ryan the feeling he wasn't worried for his own safety now, but for Ryan's.

It was just enough, combined with the now unmistakable sound of the car engine in his ear. Ryan swallowed and held out his arm. Shane grabbed it and stuck the object to it, leaving his hand there for just an extra second before pressing one to the inside of his own arm. Then he very quickly ducked around him.

Ryan spun on his heel and watched as Shane jogged over to where his bike was parked and stuck the same thing to the side. Ryan lifted his arm for examination.

The only thing he had to compare it to was a pop socket. It was roughly the same size and shape as the one stuck to the back of his own phone, but instead of a design, it just looked like mirrored aluminum. Ryan frowned down at it, moving it all around to spot the sun, the horizon, everything except...himself. He couldn't see himself in the reflection.

The car was now uncomfortably close. He could see it now, a dot on the fuzzy desert horizon. In seconds he knew the two of them would be visible, and they had nowhere to hide, no possible way to get a good enough head start. And besides, Shane was now standing between him and the bike with no obvious desire to jump on. He now looked oddly calm, staring at like Ryan with the sun slightly in his eyes, a goofy looking smile on his face. He looked like a man who'd already won, and Ryan was just going to have to take comfort in that. 

So instead of trying to run, he picked up his helmet and slid it back on his head, which made Shane smile wider, and stared the car down.

They were flying down the road faster than any car had the right to. And they weren't slowing down. At all. At the last second, Ryan wondered if they meant to just veer off slightly and mow them down.

Instead, they flew past the two of them so fast that Ryan couldn't even see the men in the front seat. He watched them for a long time, until they finally disappeared into the fuzzy desert magic made by the hot pavement.

"Sorry," Shane was the first to break the silence. The look on his face didn't make him look very sorry. He tapped the pop socket stuck to his arm. "I would've told you but...you wouldn't have believed me anyway, right?"

Ryan slowly lifted the helmet off of his head and looked down at the circle on his arm again, bewildered. "What..." he had so many questions floating to the surface he didn't know which one would come out of his mouth first. He felt like his brain was shorting out. Finally he just said "You do speak English. I knew it."

"Is that really...? God, Ryan!" Shane wheezed, doubling over. He came back up and pointed to his ear. "It's a translator, dingus! It broke when I hit the ground real hard!"

"No? No! That doesn't make fucking sense Shane!! How does an _earpiece_ translate what comes out of your _dumb mouth??_ "

"You're really asking about that? Rather than how I just made you and your bike invisible?"

"I'm getting to that!!"

"Fine! That's...fair, fine. So. So it's just all..." Shane drew a line with his finger from his ear, down the line his jaw, and to his mouth. "...connected. Including up here!" He gestured more generally around his head, then dropped his hand. "That's kind of it."

Ryan stayed silent. Shane continued.

"It's like...you know Teen Titans?"

That was the last straw. Ryan felt his brain officially leaking out his ear.

"Yeah Shane, I've heard of them. Don't know them personally."

"Well...I'm Cyborg!" He pointed to himself. Ryan frowned at him.

"You're not Cyborg from Teen Titans. Why not just say 'I'm a cyborg'? Do you think I'm stupid?"

"No? That just sounds weird to me. I don't think we have that word." Shane went back to messing with his phone. Infuriating.

They stood like that for a minute, Ryan trying to process while his whole body cooked, and Shane swiping through screens until he seemed to find the one he was looking for, something that looked like a big red button.

"So who's 'we'?" Ryan asked finally.

"The mirrors hide you from anyone that doesn't have one on, thanks for asking," Shane tapped the circle on his arm. 

"Yeah thanks, I figured that out. How does that work?"

"Uh? I'm not actually sure, not my area. I just I think they're neat!" Shane waved his phone around for emphasis, the big red button still sitting on the screen untouched. "And...that one before is a big question with a big answer."

Shane stopped gesticulating and took a deep breath. His tone veered towards serious for the first time, making Ryan stand up straighter. "I can answer it if you want me to, and to be honest I really want to. I've never met anyone like you. I feel like the question I should be asking here is, can I trust you? But I don't need to! You've...fuck!"

Shane closed the gap between them and gathered him up in a tight hug. Ryan stood there stiff for a second, before leaning into it. He smelled the same as he did this morning when they woke up. That was to say, bad. They were both in dire a shower. It was comforting, somehow.

After a moment Shane continued, speaking directly into Ryan's hair, so soft he almost couldn't hear him. "You've saved my life twice now, you know."

"...I don't think the first time counted."

"Definitely did. I think I would've woken up on the side of the road with those guys standing over me."

"Who are they? And you never answered my last question," Ryan leaned back to look at him. Shane visibly swallowed.

"It's...mmm." Shane bit his lip and brushed Ryan's hair out of his face. "Here's the thing. I can bring you into my world, but I can't bring you back out. You could leave me here, go back to California, pretend none of this ever happened." He nodded in the direction the car had disappeared. "As long as you never talk about it, they'd probably leave you alone."

"Probably?" Ryan hadn’t really had time to consider the ramifications of...what? Harboring a known criminal? Resisting arrest? Assuming those suits were government suits, and not the mob. "You sure about that?"

"They've got bigger fish to fry."

"Meaning you? You're the bigger fish?"

"I told you, you have to decide first if this," Shane gestured towards the road again, then to himself, "is something you really want to get involved with."

Ryan did consider it then. His first thought was of his parents, his brother. "Will they go after my family?"

"I have the tools to protect you and anyone you're worried about. But I'd um, have to be a pretty constant presence in your life for a little while, getting stuff set up. So...factor that in, I guess."

"So you're still coming to California with me?"

"If you'll have me."

"Is that all the warning is for? Like are you proposing right now? Because I'm pretty down after last night, but buy me dinner first."

"No, it just fucking..." Shane laughed and took Ryan's face in both his hands. "Focus. It would change things for you. Your perspective, maybe. And you can't tell a soul. That's literally all I can I say. I need you to think about it."

Ryan looked down at his lips and up again. He'd made up his mind a while ago.

After a few seconds of pretend contemplation, he said "So. You're really standing here asking me if I want to 'solve the unsolved'? As if I could say I could say no to that?"

Shane kissed him. The second he pulled back, Ryan found the cell phone screen and pressed the big red button for him. Shane didn't even look, just continued to beam at him.

At first it sounded like a thunderclap, so sudden that Ryan jumped. He looked up in time to see the clouds start to move faster.

"My turn to take you for a ride," Shane had to shout over the whooshing of the wind that had already picked up, as if a helicopter was about to land right on top of them.

The clouds parted and Ryan actually gasped. It wasn't a helicopter. There was a more technical term for it that Shane would tell him later, but Ryan would almost never use it. He knew what it was.

A goddamn flying saucer.

\---

The bike roared its way down the road through a tiny New Mexico town, from one end to another, in search of a watering hole. At the final intersection before the land once again became vast and empty, there were the town's two restaurants. On the right, an old 50s-style diner, and on the left, an Applebee's. Over the idling bike and through his thick helmet, Ryan thought he could hear Shane yelling something about endless appetizers, but he swung right anyway and pulled in beside the diner. Something inside him just told him this is where you take your new alien friend.

Once they were inside it definitely made a weird sort of sense to him, watching Shane, an alien, order a triple stack of blueberry pancakes and sip diner coffee.

An _alien_.

"So," Ryan said, sipping at his own coffee as casually as he could muster.

"So we're in a very public place right now, and while I'm not opposed to talking about it, I want you to keep that in mind. Broad strokes." Shane pointed at Ryan with his fork for emphasis.

"So. Broad strokes, you're an alien."

"Can you-? Shit Ryan that's exactly what I don't mean. Keep your voice down." Shane laughed, not even lowering his own voice. He did look around at the two other filled booths all the way across the restaurant, for show. "You said you wouldn't tell anyone. Yelling about it in the middle of a Denny's counts."

"Yeah man, okay. Also this isn't a Denny's. How do you even know what a Denny's is? Yesterday you didn't even know the difference between beer and Mike's Hard." Ryan continued in a slightly hushed tone.

"We've...we've been here for a while. The beer thing, like I said, translator was super broken. All day. Sucked. It's a miracle you understood anything coming out of my mouth. I don't even know how much of that was like, grammatically correct. It _felt_ wrong." Shane said the last sentence through bites of pancake. He ate like he hadn't eaten in days. Maybe Ryan had gotten a little too used to living off protein bars.

"Couldn't tell you either way." Ryan leaned back in the booth and shrugged. Then he very quickly leaned back in. "Here's the thing, I have a numbered list of questions I've been making since you pushed that red button and I'm not running on enough hours of sleep to be tactful about it. Can we just go through them rapid fire? As broad of strokes as I can?"

"Go for it, tiger."

"Alright," Ryan counted off on his fingers. "Number 1: are you the 'A' word, answered. Number 2: How long have you been here?"

"Couple decades, give or take."

"A couple dec-?!" Ryan pivoted quickly into a coughing fit as the waitress passed. "A couple decades?" He whispered, leaning even further over the table.

"'We' have been. I personally hadn't actually touched down until a few years ago."

"And before that?"

"Orbiting." Shane waved his forkful of pancake generally towards the ceiling. "We have a decent sized ship up there for the majority of the team, then we send out smaller ships for individual missions. Like mine! How'd you like her?"

A lot, as it turned out. Ryan had liked boarding the spacecraft the most. When the inside turned out to be one half science lab and one half messy studio apartment? That also had its own sort of charm, if he were being honest. That studio apartment being lined wall to wall with movie posters and shelves full of DVDs and video games? The hits just kept on coming.

"It...she's something." He instinctively looked out the window at the sky, where the ship may or may not have been hovering. They'd had to park it a few miles back and ride his bike into town to avoid suspicion. Can't just land on top of a diner and demand pancakes. "Wait. You said a team? What kind of team?"

Shane grinned. "Ok now that I was honest with you about."

"What? Spies? Weather people?"

"Climate scientists, Ryan, Jesus." Shane sat back with a smug look on his face, as if he were supposed to be impressed, or if that was supposed to spark some amazing revelation. He wasn't and it didn't.

"Okay?" Ryan frowned. "So you go around planet to planet, measuring temperatures and stuff? What's Mercury like this time of year?"

Shane's face fell a little, but not entirely. "Hot. But we're pretty preoccupied with Earth right now."

"Because we're fucking it up?"

"Bingo, baby!" Shane winked at him.

"Great, thanks for that. Anyway, you're making me lose track of where we are." This line of thinking was starting to make Ryan queasy. He certainly wasn't ready to find out what Shane had to do with the rain last night. They could circle back. "Number 3...ish: Where are 'we' from?"

"Betelgeuse V."

"Fuck off." Ryan said, though he couldn't help but smile.

"It's...not something I can say in a human language. You guys haven't found it yet, so it doesn't have a name here yet. Not my fault. Want me to point in its general direction tonight when the stars are out?"

Ryan thought that sounded lovely, but he wouldn't say so. Not yet. "Betelgeuse V it is, then. Number 4: You look very, very human."

"Not a question, but thanks. It's my face. Well...yeah, it's my face."

"The one you were born with?"

"Is that the face _you_ were born with?"

"That's how humans work!"

"You must've been one crazy looking baby, then! It's...well," Shane scratched his head, pausing his pancake inhalation. "We're born one way, then we can kind of...pick where we go next with it. Have to adapt to the environment wherever we go, anyway."

"You're shapeshifters?"

"We're shapeshifters! Cool, yeah, let's go with that!"

"Shapeshifting cyborgs."

"Cyborg from Teen Titans."

"Cyborg like from Teen Titans," Ryan rubbed his temples. He looked at Shane for a moment, frowning. "So you just, like, made up this face?" 

"Stole it right off this guy in Chicago during my last mission. Don't give me that look, he's fine. I just mean I copied it. It's an interesting face!"

"And he didn't think that was weird at all??"

"There's, you know, doppelgängers and shit. He's in Chicago. We'll literally never meet." Shane had stopped eating all together. He looked like if he had to talk about his own face for much longer he'd actually be sick, so Ryan very quickly changed the subject. 

"Alright, second to last question. Are you really coming to California with me?"

Shane gave him what he probably thought was a sly grin. "Why do you keep asking? You have a crush on me or something?"

"Nah, you're just great on camera."

"I could definitely stand to take a quick vacation. Maybe take an assignment there, if I like it."

Ryan tried to swallow the stupid giddy feeling bubbling up from his chest, and all the nerves that came with it, and failed miserably. 

"Cool."

"Cool. You don't even have to buy me a helmet, I can drive myself!"

"Oh, we're getting you a helmet. Last and most important question?"

"Shoot."

Ryan pointed with his spoon for emphasis. "Did you. Lay eggs. In my belly button?"

Shane fully choked on his last bite of pancake and just managed to spit it out.

"Fuck you Ryan. Fuck you on the bike you rode in on."

"I'm pretty sure it's 'and'."

Shane opened his mouth to argue, but stopped when his phone started violently vibrating. He hit a button and rolled his eyes at the display on the screen.

Ryan leaned over and squinted at the tiny text. Shane hit another button and a video feed popped up. He recognized it immediately as the surveillance system Shane had shown him on the ship, as well as the black car that had just entered the small town.

"Sorry about your refill." Shane said quietly. He looked around, then quickly reached under his sleeve and turned the mirror pop socket counter clockwise. He blinked out of existence in that ultra-fast way that makes brains question whether he'd ever actually been sitting there at all.

Ryan mimicked the action and left a twenty on the table, sending his own silent apologies to the waitress and fry cook.

They snuck out through the kitchen, then loaded Ryan's invisible bike onto Shane's invisible spaceship, and Ryan tried not to think too hard about the black car pulling into the parking lot right as the hatch was closing. He'd have to make a new list as they went.

Shane made him another mug of coffee and sat him down at a control panel with a map on the screen. He pulled up an office chair and sat facing him. For a moment, they both just looked at eachother.

"I forgot I was shot at today," Ryan said.

"It's...been a long one already, huh," Shane said, hunched over. "I'm really sorry about all that. All of this, I guess. Do you still think it's worth it?"

"Yeah, Shane." The softness of his own voice surprised Ryan, clutching his mug closer to his chest. He'd heard the implied "Am _I_ worth it?" in the question. Of course he was. Ryan had made that decision long before he'd known about the spaceship. Quick to change the subject, he asked "Number 7 is now: who are they?"

Shane sighed and scratched the back of his neck. Ryan had thought this entire conversation was strange and frustrating in a way he couldn't put his finger on, but watching Shane now, something clicked. He'd never seen anyone struggle so much to explain even the most basic aspects of their life, their situation, or themselves. It wasn't for lack of trying, though. He'd probably never, or almost never, had to do anything but lie or be alone. And he wasn't good at lying.

Ryan swallowed and shook his head. "You can just say it's the MIB, if it's the MIB."

Shane looked up again, his eyebrows raised. "Well...yeah, actually." Then he added "Not like Will Smith, though."

"Yeah obviously. I did a whole episode about them a while ago. God Shane, do you even watch the show?"

Shane's expression broke and he laughed. Ryan smiled too, just watching him. He couldn't believe how fast they'd gone back to flirting. They were going to be one insufferable twosome.

Shane finally coughed and cleared his throat. "I will get caught up, I promise. Anything else you wanna go over before we get going?"

"That's it for now," Ryan lied.

"Good. I know you're on a road trip, probably got a real tight schedule, and I'd feel really bad if all of this," Shane gestured from himself and then around the small space, "...kept you from it. So, Ryan…" He leaned over Ryan's shoulder and pinch-zoomed in on the south western United States. The display looked like something out of a Marvel movie, so beautiful it made Ryan want to cry.

"Where's our next spooky adventure?"

Ryan looked up at him and back down. He tried the same motion, finding the nearest medium-sized city with only a little bit of difficulty.

"Stopping off here first. Need to restock, also find an Apple store for me, a Harley store for you."

"I'm getting a Harley?"

"You're getting a helmet or you're not riding my bike anymore. Then..." He scrolled over almost to the state border and pointed.

"Our next spooky adventure awaits."

The list in his head was still growing, it probably would for a long, long time. But it was time they had now, together.

**Author's Note:**

> Tumblr is theyhavehorns (follow from sweetdreamsmadeofpeas)


End file.
